Cox, George - Aryan Mythology Vol 2.pdf

ERECHTHEUS AND KEKROPS. oU
mother when she goes to Hephaistos to ask for a suit of CHAP,
armour, the fire-fashioned raiment of the morning. When the »
child is born she nourishes it, as Demeter nursed Demophoon,
with the design of rendering it immortal ; and, placing it
in a chest, she gave the child to Pandrosos, Herse, and
Agraulos, charging them not to raise the lid. 1 They disobey,
and finding that the coils of a snake are folded round the
body of the child, are either slain by Athene or throw them-
selves down the precipice of the Akropolis. Henceforth the
dragon-bodied or snake-bound Erichthonios dwells in the
shrine of Athene, and under her special protection.
There were other stories of Erichthonios or Erechtheus 2 Erech-
which some mythographers assign to a grandson of the
supposed child of Hephaistos and Athene. Of this latter
Erectheus, the son of Panclion, it is said that he was killed
by the thunderbolts of Zeus, after his daughters had been
sacrificed to atone for the slaughter of Eumolpos by the
Athenians— a tale manifestly akin to the punishment of
. ,
theus *
Tantalos after the crime committed on his son Pelops.
But the legend of Erichthonios is merely a repetition of Kekrops.
the myth of the dragon-bodied Kekrops, who gave his name
to the land which had till then been called Akte, and who
became the father not only of Erysichthon but of the three
sisters who proved faithless in the charge of Erichthonios.
To the time of Kekrops is assigned one version of the story
which relates the rivalry of Poseidon and Athene ; but here
Poseidon produces not a horse, but a well on the Akropolis,
a work for which he is careless enough to produce no wit-
ness, while Athene makes her olive tree grow up beneath
1 The names Pandrosos and Herse holding a double personality. 'The
translate each other: the addition of Homeric Scholiast treated Erichtheus
Agraulos merely states that the dew and Erichthonios as the same person
covers the fields. under two names ; and since in regard
2 Of the name Erichthonios, Preller, to such mythical persons there exists no
Gr. Myth. i. 159, says, 'Der Name . . . other test of identity of the subject
recht eigentlich einen Genius der frucht- except perfect similarity of attributes,
baren Erdbodens bedeutet,' and com- this seems the reasonable conclusion.'
pares it with ipiovvt]s, ZpifioiXos, and Grote, History of Greece, i. 264. The
other words. If Erechtheus and Erich- case is, however, altered when we find
thonios are names for one and the same the names in the mythology of other
person, the explanation which regards nations, in which the origin of the word
the name as a compound of x^"»
tne no longer remains open to doubt,
earth, seems to become at least doubtful. Preller, Gr. Myth. ii. 136.
There is, however, no ground for up-
'